Normally, driving a car with a stonking V8 engine powering the front wheels is like watching Michael Moore and Rush Limbaugh make out. It's so wrong on so many levels. Can you squeal like a pig? Just so. Will that pig's snout dart about like an amphetamine-crazed truffle-sniffer? Uh-huh. But here's the kicker: what if it doesn't? And what if you, uh, like it? Does that make you a deviant pistonhead? No, it makes you a closet fan of the quietly nutty, deeply cool Buick LaCrosse Super.

The LaCrosse Super is not cool in the traditional sense– as in sex-on-wheels or race-car-for-the-road. It's got that James Dean/Steve McQueen thing happening: effortless, been there done that, I don't need to show you shit (but I can and will). Alternatively, you could say the Super Buick has a large dose of that ineffable "WTF did you buy THAT for?" appeal.

There is no flash. The Super's sheet metal offers clean, feline haunches, graceful proportions, a porthole or eight and some dual stainless steel exhausts– with chrome tips! Everything is round and fluid to a rental car lot fault. There is so little drama in the design that nothing grabs your attention. It flies completely under the radar; no bad thing for lead foots.